Jefferson Davis' Speech at Richmond, Va.

Executive Mansion, January 5, 1863

Friends and Fellow-citizens: Of the title as corrected, I am proud--the other I would scorn to hold.--[Applause.]

I am happy to be welcomed on my return to the Capital of our
Confederacy--the last hope, as I believe, for the perpetuation of that
system of government which our forefathers founded--the asylum of the
oppressed and the home of true representative liberty.

Here, in the ancient Commonwealth of Virginia the great principles of
human government were proclaimed by your ancestors; here great battles
for freedom have been fought, when the grand system they founded was
attempted to be overturned by those who got possession of a government
which they could not comprehend, and which, in six months, they see
themselves wholly unable to administer.

Anticipating the overthrow of that Government which you had
inherited, you assumed to yourselves the right, as your fathers had done
before you, to declare yourselves independent, and nobly have you
advocated the assertion which you have made. Here, upon your soil, some
of the fiercest battles of the Revolution were fought, and upon your
soil it closed by the surrender of Cornwallis. Here again are men of
every State; here they have congregated, linked in the defence of a most
sacred cause. They haved battled, they have bled upon your soil, and it
is now consecrated by blood which cries for vengeance against the
insensate foe of religion as well as of humanity, of the altar as well
as of the hearthstone.

You have shown yourselves in no respect to be degenerate sons of your
fathers. You have fought mighty battles, and your deeds of valor will
live among the richest spoils of Time's ample page. It is true you have a
cause which binds you together more firmly than your fathers were. They
fought to be free from the usurpations of the British crown, but they
fought against a manly foe. You fight against the offscourings of the
earth.--[Applause.]

Men who were bound to you by the compact which their fathers and
themselves had entered into to secure to you the rights and principles
not only guaranteed by the Declaration of Independence, but rights which
Virginia wisely and plainly reserved in her recognition of the
government in which she took a part, now come to you with their hands
steeped in blood, robbing the widow, destroying houses, seizing the
grey-haired father, and incarcerating him in prison because he will not
be a traitor to the principles of his fathers and the land that gave him
birth.

Recently, my friends, our cause has had the brightest sunshine to
fall upon it, as well in the West as in the East. Our glorious Lee,
the valued son, emulating the virtues of the heroic Light-horse Harry,
his father, has achieved a victory at Fredericksburg, and driven the
enemy back from his last and greatest effort to get "on to Richmond."
But a few, however, did get on to Richmond.--(Laughter.) A few, I trust,
may come from every battle fleid to fulfil the pledge they made that
they would come to Richmond-- but they will come as captives, not as
conquerors. (Applause.)

In the West, too, at Murfreesboro you have gained a victory over
hosts vastly superior to our own in number. You have achieved a result
there as important, as brilliant as that which occurred on the soil of
Virginia; and cotemporaneously at Vicksburg, where they were struggling
to get possession of the great artery, the control of the Mississippi
river, to answer the demands of the North West. In every combat there
they have been beaten, and I trust they will be beaten in future. Out of
this victory is to come that dissatisfaction in the North West, which
will rive the power of that section; and thus we see in the future the
dawn--first separation of the North West from the Eastern States, the
discord among them which will paralyze the power of both;--then for us
future peace and prosperity.

Every crime which could characterize the course of demons has marked
the course of the invader. The Northern portion of Virginia has been
ruthlessly desolated--the people not only deprived of the means of
subsistence, but their household property destroyed, and every indignity
which the base imagination of a merciless foe could suggest inflicted,
without regard to age, sex or condition. In like manner their step has
been marked in every portion of the Confederacy they have invaded. They
have murdered prisoners of war; they have destroyed the means of
subsistence of families; they have plundered the defenceless, and
exerted their most malignant ingenuity to bring to the deepest
destitution those whose only offence is that their husbands and sons are
fighting for their homes and their liberties. In one instance, in the
Northwestern part of Mississippi, I have heard of them plundering the
home of a poor widow, taking her only cow, and then offering her the
oath of allegiance as the terms upon which they would furnish her
rations. Worthy to be a matron of the Southern Confederacy, she refused
it, and when I last heard of her, which was before the enemy was driven
from her home, she was living upon parched corn. May God bless her. She
is worthy to be a Matron of the Southern Confederacy. (Applause.)--Every
crime conceivable, from the burning of defenceless towns to the
stealing of our silver forks, and spoons, has marked their career. In
New Orleans Butler has exerted himself to earn the execrations of the
civilised world, and now returns with his dishonors thick upon him to
receive the plaudits of the only people on earth who do not blush to
think he wears the human form. He has stolen millions of dollars in New
Orleans from private citizens, although the usages of war exempt private
property from taxation by the enemy. It is in keeping, however, with
the character of the people that seeks dominion over you, claim to be
your masters, to try to reduce you to subjection--give up to a brutal
soldiery your towns to sack, your homes to pillage and incite servile
insurrection. But in the latter point they have failed save in this that
they have heaped if possible a deeper disgrace upon themselves. They
have come to disturb your social organizations on the plea that it is a
military necessity. For what are they waging war? They say to preserve
the Union. Can they preserve the Union by destroying the social
existence of a portion of the South? Do they hope to reconstruct the
Union by striking at everything which is dear to man? By showing
themselves so utterly disgraced that if the question was proposed to you
whether you would combine with hyenas or Yankees, I trust every
Virginian would say, give me the hyenas.-- [Cries of "Good! good!" and
applause.]

My friends, constant labor in the duties of office, borne down by
care, and with an anxiety which has left me scarcely a moment for
repose, I have had but little opportunity for social intercourse among
you. I thank you for this greeting, and hope the time may come soon when
you and I alike, relieved of the anxieties of the hour, may have more
of social intercourse than has heretofore existed, and that I may come
to participate in those quiet enjoyments that one cannot experience when
his mind is constantly dwelling upon the struggles of his country.
Whilst a man's sympathy is attracted by the sufferings of fellow
creatures, whilst every pulse of his heart beats in response to the
trials, and every thought is directed to the dangers of his country,
there is little time for the cultivation of the social enjoyments that
pertain to a time of peace. I can only give this as my excuse for my
seldom appearance among you. I can also say, with entire sincerity, that
I have nothing to regret, coupled with all the sacrifices which this
struggle for the independence of our Confederacy has brought to me. I
have borne my full share in the sacrifices of the people of whom I am a
part, but I now feel if they had been greater they would have served
only to render me more devoted to you. (Applause.)

War is an evil in every form in which it can be presented, but it has
its palliating circumstances. This is a new government, formed of
independent States, each jealous of its own sovereignty. It is necessary
that it should be tried in the severe erucible in which we are being
tested, in order to cement us together. The enjoyments and comforts we
have been compelled to renounce, the long months of deep anxiety each
has felt, the unceasing labors that have tested our united energies, the
sacrifices we have been subjected to in common, and the glory which
encircles our brow has made us a band of brothers, and, I trust, we will
be united forever. (Applause.)

On your soil has the blood of every State been shed--from your soil
has gone home the maimed soldier, and the soldier disabled by disease,
and to every State of the Confederacy has been borne the story of the
hospitality of Virginians; how the kind women have nursed his wasted
form and bathed his fevered brow. When in years to come arises the
recollection of these kind attentions, his eyes will fill with tears of
gratitude and in his heart he will bless the good women of Virginia.

By the firm friendship soldiers from different States have formed and
cemented by mutual hardships and dangers; by the glory in which all
alike participate; by the congeniality of thought and sentiment, which
united us at first in a common destiny, and the thousand events and
associations which have since tended to render us more united by all
these causes the existence of jealousies and rivalries will be
prevented, and when peace and prosperity shall come to us, we will go on
assisting each other to develop the great political ideas upon which
our Government is based and the immense resources which nature has
lavished upon us. Of the former we are awakening to an appreciation of
their deep significance. In the latter direction we are displaying
unexampled energy. Our mines have been made to yield up neglected
wealth, and manufactories start up as if by magic. We are becoming
independent in several ways. If the war continues, we shall only grow
stronger and stronger as each year rolls on. Compare our condition
to-day with that which existed one year ago. See the increasing power of
the enemy, but mark that our own has been proportionably greater, until
we see in the future nothing to disturb the prospect of the
independence for which we are struggling.--One year ago many were
depressed and some despondent. Now deep resolve is seen in every eye, an
unconquerable spirit nerves every arm. And gentle woman, too, who can
estimate the value of her services in this struggle? [Applause.] The
mother who has given her son, the wife who has given her husband, the
girl who has given her sweetheart, are not all their fingers busy making
clothing for the troops in the field, and their words of encouragement a
most animating impulse to the soldier? Whilst their prayers go up for
the safety of a friend or relative in the field, always coupled with
them is the earnest aspiration for the independence of our country. With
such noble women at home, and such heroic soldiers in the field, we are
invincible. [Applause.]

I thank you my friends for the kind salutation to-night, it is an
indication that at some future time we shall be better acquainted. I
trust we shall all live to enjoy some of the fruits of the great
struggle in which we are engaged. My prayers are for your individual and
collective welfare. May God prosper our cause and may we live to give
to our children untarnished the rich inheritance which our Fathers gave
to us. Good night.

From The Papers of Jefferson Davis, Volume 9, pp. 10-16. Transcribed from the Richmond Enquirer, January 7, 1863.